Friday, March 4, 2011

On Bass, bacon, digesting brunch











Still trying to digest brunch
From almost a week ago, five-sh days on
Bass, not the kind you catch, or eat
The kind you play, four players gathered
With one singer who writes or
Rather everyone sings, writes
I write, don’t sing, I listened
Trying to absorb their descriptions
My notes here a mess
Drummers with notes, a double bass
One octave lower, mortar in the bricks
At the Brick last night, no bass
I missed it, they’re right
A foundation, jazz talk, tuned in fourths
A Suzuki way not the motor bike type
Feel it in the earth, smell the bacon, sizzle
More than a century of this journey
In the room, a collective, digital to analogue
Kerouac’s Book of Blues on the shelf
Kicked my ass in the notebooks he filled
Scales, bass, both have ‘em you know
I don’t know, I’m thinking melody is King
This bass, the bus driver, screamin’ at kids
Sit down, but it don’t scream, it hums
You know what I mean? Pluck it too hard
The acoustic one, and it shuts itself up
Improvisation, conversation, transformation
Three things at once, Harmony, Lyric
They stayed at the cottage, time keeper
Without a timepiece, bluegrass even
Rock, you know, R, B, feel the song
Do the tighten up, you can do it now
Loose as a goose on Mateuse
Healthy competition, bass players seem open
But they slam it shut, not hard, slam!
How to stand with toes in the ground
Hum to yourself like Glenn Gould, Monk
Watch the feet 'Round Midnight whydonchya
Music as organized sound when sounders
Make sound that puts one in a pickle
Conserved, conservatories, laboratories, maestros
Beers, Easterday, Harshbarger, Hamil
McMilian’s music uses it, foundation builders
All teaching, too, gettin’ the word out
Out is just a perspective, your center
Basa nova tough, it’s somewhere in the middle
Better play it right or they’ll cut you
Yeah it’s that serious
These people, like data in the local database of sound
This ginormous feast of organized sound, disorganized
Playin’ in there, writing this, collaborate that
Throw your shoes and measure your feet, Mr. Brannock
Drink some of Marco’s V7 instead of V8, man
Guzzle it, it’s good for you, get passionate
Expatriates, lonely out there, you try it
Swing, this bearded guru, swing man, swing
Get on a stage by yourself, naked came the strangers
Talk about bass, players, writers, theory, bacon.
Friends, it's really about people, you know?
I’m full…

2 comments:

  1. love it! what a wonderful collective of players...

    ReplyDelete
  2. "Improvisation, conversation, transformation"

    Sounds so familiar, so good. I like this, Tom.

    ReplyDelete